diskAshur2

The issue you are having is caused by power saving settings on your computer. Please see below and make the appropriate changes to your computer which will stop the iStorage device from randomly disconnecting and locking.

 

 

Please go to “Control Panel” > “Power Options” and stop the PC from going to sleep. Screenshot below:

 

 

In addition, go into Advanced Settings in Power Option to disable the following:

• Turn off hard disk after: Never
• USB selective suspend setting: Disabled

This will keep any iStorage hard drive connected to the computer continuously on.

 

 

 

Additionally, change the Power management option using the steps below:

 

• Search device manager in windows start and open it
• In device manager expand Universal Serial Bus controllers and right click on USB Mass Storage Device and select Properties.
• Go to the Power Management tab. Make sure the box is unchecked for Allow the computer to turn off this device to save powerand click OK.

 

Windows Disconnect Patch

 

If the above steps do not help and your iStorage device is still disconnecting, that may be caused by a problem called USB Selective Suspend. This error first occurred with Windows 8 and rolled over with Windows 10 and server 2012 R2. This bug stops the Windows update service from fully installing the Vendor ID and Product ID for the iStorage product into the Windows registry. This is vital information for the registry to have and stops the devices from disconnecting after a set amount of time.

 

It can be downloaded directly from our website by following the link:

http://istorage-uk.com/wp-content/themes/istorage/assets/files/Windows-Disconnect-Patch.zip

 

Please unzip the contents of this file, extract to your desktop and double click on “patch.bat” file to run it. Follow the instructions on the PDF document included in the archive.

The issue might be caused by power-saving settings on your Mac. Please see below and make the appropriate changes to your Mac which will stop the iStorage device from randomly disconnecting and locking. (Please note: The steps below are based on the latest Sonoma MacOS.  The settings may differ depending on what version of macOS you are using)

Please ensure to safely shut down the Mac and restart it prior to following the below steps.

1. Please connect and unlock your iStorage device (solid green LED indicates that the drive is unlocked)
2. Go to System Settings by clicking the Apple icon in the top left corner.
3. Within the System Settings, click Battery and click on Options as shown in the screenshot below.

4. Within Options, change the setting for “Put hard disks to sleep when possible” from Always to Never as shown in the screenshot below.

There are two different ways to unlock your diskAshur². You can either use Admin or User PIN to unlock your drive.

 

To unlock your diskAshur² using the Admin PIN please follow the steps below:

1. Insert the integrated USB cable to a powered USB port of your host device
2. To access the diskAshur² as admin, first enter your Admin PIN and then press the ‘UNLOCK’ button.
3. The green and blue LEDs will alternately blink several times and finally change to a solid green LED indicating the drive is unlocked and ready to use as admin.

 

To unlock your diskAshur² using the User PIN please follow the steps below:

1. Insert the integrated USB cable to a powered USB port of your host device
2. To access the diskAshur² as the user, first press the ‘UNLOCK’ button, then enter your User PIN and press the ‘UNLOCK’ button again.
3. The green and blue LEDs will alternately blink several times and finally change to a solid green LED indicating the drive is unlocked and ready to use as the user.

You can set one Admin PIN and one User PIN on your diskAshur².

You can try unlocking your drive with the User PIN to access your data. If the User PIN has not been created, the only option would be to reset your diskAshur². After the reset process, all the PINs, the encryption key and data will all be permanently deleted. The drive will need to be formatted and partitioned before it can be reused.

The iStorage diskAshur² is a full disk encryption product. The only way to gain access to your data is by entering correct Admin or User PIN. Without the PIN, it is impossible to unlock and access data on your diskAshur².

The iStorage diskAshur² uses military-grade AES-XTS 256-bit algorithm.

The iStorage diskAshur² employs no software components and hence is totally platform independent. That means that it is universally compatible with all Operating Systems and electronic devices equipped with a powered USB port. Please make sure that your drive is formatted to the correct file system required by your Operating System.

The flashing green LED light means that the drive is trying to connect. Please try a different USB port.

If you are using a USB Hub or USB extension cable, please try connecting your diskAshur² directly to the USB port. We also recommend trying to access your drive from a different PC/device if possible.

The solid green LED light means that the drive is unlocked and connected. If you cannot see your drive, please refer to Disk Management (Windows OS)/Disk Utility (Mac OS)/Disks (Linux OS) and see if you can find your diskAshur² there.

You might be asked to initialise, allocate and format the drive to the correct file system required by your OS. For more information, please refer to “Initialising and formatting the diskAshur²” in the product manual.

Three solid LEDs mean that your diskAshur² has been brute force attacked. That happens when the admin or user PIN is entered incorrectly 10 times. Please follow the following steps to switch your drive back to standby mode where you will have 5 final attempts to enter your PIN correctly. Please note that you will only have 5 additional attempts before the drive will activate the brute force mechanism and self-reset. The reset process will delete all PINs (Admin & User), the encryption key and data.

1. Unplug the drive from the USB port
2. Press and hold the “SHIFT” button and re-plug your drive into the host whist holding the “SHIFT” button. All three LEDs (red, green and blue) will light up and blink together
3. Release “SHIFT” button
4. With all LEDs blinking, enter “4-7-8-6-7-2-4-3” and press the “UNLOCK” button to get your 5 final attempts to unlock the drive.
5. [Please describe what happens next – which LEDs will show up after pressing “UNLOCK”, what to do next (refer to the user manual “How to unlock diskAshur2 with Admin or User PIN]

BadUSB is a theoretical exploit that was presented by SR Labs at the Black Hat conference in August 2014. SR Labs demonstrated a vulnerability in one USB device that allowed malicious code to be programmed into the USB controller through a firmware update process.

The attack described is very sophisticated and, in the case of iStorage products, would require advanced knowledge of our USB controller, a leaked version of our firmware, the programming tool to update our controller, the password used for our programming tool and an in-depth understanding of the device’s functionality.

According to SR Labs, the failsafe method to eliminate this threat is to simply disable the ability to update the controller’s firmware. Many of iStorage devices shipping today, including all our USB 3.0 security products, already have the firmware locked which prevents field updates to the USB controller.

As a continuous improvement, iStorage is locking down the firmware on all USB controllers used in iStorage devices to safeguard against this vulnerability. We recommend checking our website periodically for notices regarding BadUSB and Security Updates.